Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1887-02-04

while that he has changed your heart from
a jungle of thorny skepticisms into garden
all abloom with luxuriant joy that you
have never dreamed Of; from tangled
Caprera of sadness into paradise of God!
do not know how your theological sys-
tenn went to pieces. It may be that your
parents started you with only one plank,
and you believe little or nothing. Or they
may have been too rigid and severe in re-
llRlous discipline, and cracked you over
the head with psalm book. 1t may be
that some partner in business, who was .
member of an evangelical church, played
on you trick that Disguised you with re-
ligion. 1tmay BE- that you have associates
your presence until you are all at sea"
and you dwell more on things that YOU do
not believe than on things you do believe.
You are in one respect like Lord Nelson,
when signal was lifted that he wished to
disregard, and he put his sea glass to his
blind eye and said: II really do not see
the signal" O, my nearer, put this field
glass OF the gospel no longer to your blind
eye and say cannot see, but put it to your
other eye, the eye of faith, and you will see
Christ, and He is all you need to see.
II you can believe nothing else, you GER
tainly believe in vicarious suffering, for YOU
see it almost every day in some shape.
Last month the steamship Knickerbocker,
of the Cromwell line, running between
New Orleans and here, was in great storms,
and the captain and crew saw the schooner
Mary ID. Cranmer, of Philadelphia, in dis
tress. The weather cold, the waves noun
tain high, the first officer of the steamship
and four men put out in lifeboat to save
the crew of the schooner, and reached the
vessel and towed it out of danger, the wind
shifting 30 that the schooner was saved.
But the five men of the steamship coming
back, their boat capsized, yet righted again
and came on, the sailors coated with ice.
The boat capsized again, and three times
upset and was righted, and q line was
thrown the poor fellows, but their hands
and arms were frozen SO they could not
grasp It, ard great wave rolled over them,
and they went down never to rise till the
sea gives up its dead. Appreciate that
heroism and self-sacrifice Of the brave
fellows We all can, aud can we
not appreciate the Christ who put out
IN mole biting cold and into more over
whelming surge to bring us out of infinite
peril into everlasting safety! The wave Of
human hate rolled over Him on the other
side. oh, the thickness of the night and
tuO l14uuuc1 Va VIC GeMp0St utO WHICH
Christ plunged for our rescue!
Come in on that one narrow beam, the
beam Of the cross. Let all else 20 and
cling to that. Put that under you, and
with the earnestness of swimmer strug-
Cling for his life put out for the shore.
There is a great warm fire of welcome
already built, and already many. who were
as far out rs you are, are standing in it's
genial and heavenly glow. The angels of
Gods rescue are wading out into the surf to
clutch your hand, and they know how en-
hausted you are, and all the redeemed
new white robes to clothe all those who
come in on broken pieces Of the ship.
My sympathies are for such all the more
because was naturally skcptical, disposed
to question everything about this life and
the next, and was in danger of being further
out to sea than any of the 276 in the Med
the annoyance of my theological professor
because asked so many questions. But /
came in on plank. knew Christ was
the Savior of sinners, and that 1 was sim
ner, and 1 got ashore, and do not propose
to 90 out on that sea again. have not for
thirty minutes discussed the controverted
points of theology in thirty, years. And
during the rest of my life do not propose
to discuss them for thirty seconds.
/ would rather, in mud scow, try to
weather the worst cyclone that ever swept
up from the Caribbean than risk my i'm
mortal soul in useless and perilous discus
sions in which some of my brethren in the
ministry are INDUCING. They remind me
of company of sailors standing
on Ramsgate pier head, from which
the lifeboats are usually launched, and
coolly discussing the different style
of locks and how deep boat ought
to set in the water, while hurricane was in
full blast and there are three steamers
crowded with passengers going to pieces
in the ofing. An old tar, the muscles OF
his face working with nervous excitement,
cries out: "This is no time 10 discuss such
things. Man the lifeboat! Who will VOL
unteer? Out with her into the surf! Pull,
my lads, pull for the wreck! Ha! ha! New
down on the bottom of the boat. Jack.
you try to bring them to. Put these fan
nels around their hands and feet, and
will pull for the shore. God help me
There! Landed! Huzza!" When there
are SO many struggling in the waves of sin
and sorrow and wretchedness, let all else
90 but salvation for time aud salvation for
ever.
Ibethink myself that there are some
here whose opportunity or whose life is a
mere wreck. and they have only o small
piece left. You started in your youth with
all sails set, and everything promised 9
grand voyage, but Eeu have sailed in the
wrong direction or have foundered on q
rock. You have only fragment OF
time left. Then come in on that one
plank. "Some on broken pieces of the
ship"
You admit that you are all brokenup, one
decade of your life gone by, two decades,
three decades, four decades, half century.
perhaps three-quarters Of century gone.
The hour hand and the minute hand of
your clock of life are almost parallel, and
soon it will be II, and your day ended.
Clear discouraged, are you? admit it is
sud thing to give all of our lives that is
worth anything 10 sin and the devil, and
then ut last to make God present of a
tirst-rate corpse. But the past you cannot
recover. Get on board that old ship you
never will. Have you only one more year
left, one more month, one more week, one
more day, one more hour--come in on that
Perhaps if you get to heaven God may let
you go out on some great mission to some
other world, where you can somewhat atone
for your lack Of service in this.
From many deathbed have seen the
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